You Pretend
by Mittens Arm
Summary: AU in which Kurt and Blaine do not meet until they go to college. Blaine's life isn't working out the way that he wishes it would and he cannot handle it. This is mostly about Blaine and his internal thoughts dealing with his depression.


Media: Fic  
>Title: You Pretend<br>Rating: pg-13  
>Warnings: <strong>TRIGGER WARNINGS: Depression, suicidal thoughts, anxiety, paranoia, feelings of worthlessness<strong>  
>Word Count: Approximately 3,000 words<br>Summary: AU in which Kurt and Blaine do not meet until they go to college. Blaine's life isn't working out the way that he wishes it would and he cannot handle it. This is mostly about Blaine and his internal thoughts dealing with his depression.

For the longest time I've been struggling. It seems like everything should be fine. I should be happy: I'm at the school of my dreams, I have good grades, I might be in a relationship. I should be ecstatic.

Nothing is wrong, nothing is ever wrong. There is always a cloud over everything though. There is the general stress and feeling alone. Now that school has been going for a while people are really starting to form their friend groups, everyone seems to be in love, to have a best friend. I am alone. Sure there are people out there that claim they are my friend and seem like they like me, but I'm just another member of the group.

Stress is everywhere. It's getting to midterms. My classes are getting harder and I have so much work. I'm working harder and more but it still doesn't matter. My grades are slipping. I might not be failing, but I'm not getting the A's that I need. I've failed my a few quizzes and I know that I can get my grades up, but I'm better than this. I just feel like a failure.

The stress has put me in a strange mind set. I want to hang out with people; I desperately do not want to be alone. At the same time I'm too afraid to try and hang out with people because I feel like they are all too busy and I don't want to burden them. Everyone has their own problems; they don't need mine as well. I don't want to annoy them.

High school was difficult, but not in the same way that this is. I was in public school and that was terrible. They bullied me. But I ran, that was it, it was over. Then I went to Dalton. It was a lot of work, but I knew how to deal with it. That stress was my life and I still had friends. I was the lead man of the Warblers, I was a straight A student, I was perfect. I am not perfect here.

In high school they loved me, I was a star. Here I am just another student that used to get straight As. I'm just another person with talent. I'm just another person who came from a fancy prep school. Sure I fit in, but that means that I'm just like everyone else, I am no one.

In high school I never had a boyfriend. There were a few crushes and they all failed, let alone the terrible incident in public school. Even though Dalton was understanding, no one else was.

Here everyone is understanding. I've found someone. I like him. I thought that maybe my luck would be better here. I told him that I liked him. We talked. He might not have felt the same way, but we were friends anyway and he was willing to give it a shot, to give _us_a shot. So we did. We ate breakfast together three days a week, I would text him, I would ask him to hang out. None of it would matter. Before we started this 'relationship' we had hugged a few times. Since we've been in it we've hugged one but that is it. I'm too afraid to hold him because I don't want to be too forward and scare him. Neither of us has been in a relationship before.

I don't think we are even in a relationship. We've just been hanging out as friends. The only thing that has changed is that now it is awkward. Now when we hang out there is some sort of terror hanging above our heads. What will people think of us? What is expected of us? I wonder what he is thinking. I don't know what Kurt wants from me. Sure, we've established the title of relationship, but that is all that it is: a title. In actuality we are just pretending to be something that we are not.

When we are alone everything is okay. We talk and we share our stories. We play cards. We watch movies. He is scared, I understand this. We sit a good distance apart. When we are in large groups we generally avoid each other. We don't make it known that there is anything between us, we don't sit together, we don't talk. He barely talks at all. I know that he has been through a lot and I know that this is hard for him; I just wish that he wouldn't be so afraid. I want him to come out of his shell. I want him to make friends. I just want to love him and for him to love me back.

I worry about everything. I've gotten to the point where I am upset pretty much all the time. I hold things in, I always have since Dalton. I know that there people that care and people I could talk to, but I can't. I don't want to burden people. I want people to like me. No one likes people who are not happy, so I am happy.

Each morning I wake up and put on my mask. I gel down my hair and I put up a wall. I mask the sadness and put on a happy face with my gel.

Of course masking the sadness makes it get worse. I write in my journal every night. For the longest time I would write what "I" did but I cannot do it anymore. I do not want to be me anymore.

You slip into the second person because first person is too hard.

You get to the point where you do not want to pretend anymore, but you've built up so many defense mechanism and walls that you cannot imagine bringing them down. It would be too much work. You've become accustom to these walls and pretending.

But you still desperately want to talk to someone. You hope that anyone will realize that you are upset and ask you about it, but they won't. They never do. You write in your journal, you joke about being upset; you bring yourself to casually talk about it with your friends.

It all just makes it worse.

You find yourself sitting in your room all the time. You cannot be around other people. Your roommate walks in sometimes and he is judging you, he is always judging you. He judges you consistently. You stop talking to him. He judges more.

Your room is no longer a safe place for you. He could come in anytime or he could bring his friends. You cannot stay there. You cannot be there.

So you spend time in the library, because no one will notice you there. You can sit among the stacks of books and feel the enormity of them. You can sit in the computer lab and feel like people are around you. Just the physical proximity of other people working is enough for a while. You pretend to do copious amounts of work and drown yourself in your readings and practice problems. You get no work down and end up playing games and listening to music.

You go back to your room.

You go to meals.

You go to classes.

You go to clubs.

You place a smile on your face and you make it seem okay. In trying to convince everyone else you can fool yourself for a while.

You return to your room.

You have no work to do, not that you could focus on studying if you tried. You mindlessly browse the web but there is nothing there that amuses you. You try to read but you get distracted and it's pointless.

You cannot do _anything_. But doing nothing isn't enough. You curl up on your bed and let yourself think.

The thinking is a terrible thing. You should never be alone with your thoughts when you are like this. You fall deeper and deeper into them. They slowly consume you.

That's all that there is anymore.

You can't leave your room because you don't want to see people, if you see people you know that you'll break down.

But you want to break down, you know that you have to.

You continue to take your medicine.

You take your vitamins.

You raise your hand in class.

You go to meals and classes and clubs.

You act like everything is alright.

You try to go to bed early each night. But you cannot sleep. You sit in your bed and get worse. Because all that's left when you're alone in your room at night are your thoughts. And it's even worse when your roommate is there because he's judging you. He surely must know that you are upset, not that he cares. You spend night after restless night wrestling with your thoughts and switching between sleeping and not.

You get up.

You have all of your classes today. You go to breakfast and sit with the same people that you sit with every few days. You joke. You smile. You're the joke. But it's normal. You go to your classes and you raise your hand and you answer questions and everything is lovely. You fail more quizzes.

You go to lunch. You haven't wanted to eat in a while. You make yourself eat. You sample the food that your cafeteria has to offer. Foods that should be delicious and foods that should be disgusting taste the same; you do not want any of them. But you have to eat so you do. If you didn't then everyone would know that something was wrong. You spend as little time in the cafeteria as possible because there are so many people there and they are all judging you.

You go to your room. You try to study.

You go take a test, you likely fail. You go to your room. You leave before your roommate will be back because you know when he'll be back and you don't want him to see you in the room again. You feel like he always sees you there and he must be judging you for that.

You go to the library. You pour yourself into your work.

Your practice is canceled.

You go to dinner. You sit with a large group of people. You jest. You smile. You laugh. You leave. You sit in your room.

None of your friends are going to the meeting tonight. You walk off campus alone. You're cold. You are scared.

You get there.

"You look frightened, is everything alright?"

You claim that all is fine. You laugh and paste a smile on your face, because why would anything be wrong?

You sit through the meeting. You speak your mind on the topic. You sit with your friends afterwards. You joke. You tell the truth. You say that you're upset. You say that you'll eat lunch with them tomorrow, maybe, if you're still alive.

They stop and hug you. They understand vaguely that you are hurting. You hug them back. You needed this. You curl yourself into their warm and hold on for far too long.

They go back to your room with you. You cuddle on your bed. They tell you not to hurt yourself; you assure them that you will be alright.

They leave.

You're alone in your room. You think again. It gets worse.

You need to talk to someone. You can't be alone anymore. You can't do this. You don't want to live today. You don't want to live tomorrow. You don't want to be alive.

You don't want to be here, you don't want to be anywhere. You don't want to die, you'll never hurt yourself. You just can't do this.

You are worthless.

There is nothing to live for.

You need to cry.

You text people because you need to actually talk. You text Kurt because you think he'll understand. You first enquire if he is studying. As you get more upset you ask him just to text you back no matter what, that you need to talk to him. He doesn't respond. No one responds.

Someone texts you back and they are doing kind of busy, doing homework. Is everything alright?

You are sorry to bother them.

You go to take a shower.

Someone texts you, do you want to hang out? You are going to take a shower. You leave your room. You knock on your door.

You stare at them.

Is everything okay?

You're broken. You cry. Then hold you, in your towel, your toiletry caddy between you. You cry. The tears finally flow free and you are gasping. You don't embrace them back because you are holding your caddy. You just let yourself be held while you get the tears out of your system.

Do you want to talk about it?

You shake your head.

You go shower.

You dry yourself off, you put on your pajamas. You have no new text messages. You brush your hair. You knock on her door again and she follows you back to your room.

You sit on your bed in silence. You want her to bring it up. You need to talk about it. You explain, she understands.

You leave your room and sit outside. She knows that you need a change of scenery from your dorm room. You grab your blanket and the two of you lie down outside. You reason with your feelings with her.

She's been in the same place that you are.

You tell her about Kurt, as you have the whole time. You tell her that he's stressing you out; that you don't understand what is going on between you. You know that something needs to change.

Your hair is wet. It's cold. You go inside.

You lie in your bed and try to sleep. You are consumed with the thoughts again. You can handle it now, talking has made it better. Eventually you fall asleep.

—

You get up.

You have no new text messages.

You go to breakfast. You sit with him like you do every few days. You make yourself eat. You don't want to look at him.

He got your texts, what did you want to talk about?

Don't worry about it.

You sit in awkward silence. You talk about your classes. You don't want to look at him.

Is everything alright?

No.

Do you want to talk about it?

No.

Because you don't want to cry in the dining hall. You can feel yourself starting to shake. You are upset again. You are scared. You need to talk to him.

You finish eating. You put your plate away. You leave him.

You ask if you can talk.

You walk around campus. You tell him about last night. You somehow bring yourself to tell him about how you were feeling, how you didn't want to live last night. That you are not suicidal but you can't do this.

He feels bad. You feel worse.

You explain how you are feeling. You are calm now. You try to phrase it eloquently, you don't have a problem. You constantly want to go back to being alright but you cannot.

You walk around the campus four times.

You talk.

He tells you that he cares about you. You cringe because you don't believe that anyone could care about you and that he's just saying that to you because you are so upset. He tells you that you can talk to him. He tries to reason with you. He talks to you about your classes and your friends. He tells you how much you have going for you.

You talk about your relationship: It isn't working. You break up, if you can break up from what you currently have.

You can still be friends, you can still talk, you can still text him.

You don't need to apologize. You don't need to feel bad. You don't need to beat yourself up.

Every time that the conversation stops you think. You feel bad. You've ruined two friendships. You can't look at him. You don't want to talk to him. You can't be here. You can't do this.

You tell him that you are thinking this.

He's gotten too close.

You try to explain why you are freaking out, why you don't like to talk to people, why you are sorry.

The walls are too broken down.

You put them back up. As you walk you can feel yourself quickly closing up. You want to curl into yourself and disappear. You don't want to be here. You don't want to be anywhere.

You rapidly try to block him out. You will not look at him you will not talk to him again. He knows too much and you are too vulnerable. He should leave. You should go back to your dorm.

You dismiss him.

You do not want this. You know you are wrong. You want to hug him. You want to have held his hand. You want to have never talked to him.

You feel terrible for putting the walls back. You want to let him in. You cannot.

You go back to your room.

You go to class.

You raise your hand.

Your go to meals.

You smile.

You jest.

You pretend that everything is alright.


End file.
